Browsing by Author "Philippe, M'boua Bogui Degni"

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    Self-Knowledge: An Essential Key To Efficient Ministry
    (Tangaza University College, 2011) Philippe, M'boua Bogui Degni
    The self is a concept which defines what is most personal and unique about an individual. The self includes the body, mind, and spirit; abilities and limitations; and repressed and remembered experience both positive and negative, bodily experience, relational experience, cultural experience, religious experience. I think there is a great need to know and to accept ourselves just as we are. Those of us with power and social standing have subtle ways of hiding our inner handicaps, our difficulties in relationships, our inner darkness and violence, our depression and lack of self-confidence. When all is well we may fall into conceit or pride; when there are difficulties or failures, we can fall into self-depreciation and depression. How difficult it is to accept our limitations and our handicaps as well as our gifts and capacities. We feel that if others see us as we really are they might reject us. So we cover over our weaknesses. I have experienced my own limits at certain moments, when I realized there was great anger and violence rising up in me with respects to certain members of my family. That truth was first revealed to me by my novice master. He called me one day during my Spiritual year and told me that he could perceive that I was carrying a deep sense of anger. He could see it, he said, in my actions and behaviors. He said that this problem was affecting my relationship with the other members of the community. He told me that I was aggressive. Of course I did not agree with him. I told him I have always been a quiet man and very focused. He asked me just to think about what he had just told me. Since then, I have never been at peace with myself. Deep inside me, I started feeling the need to know why my novice master mentioned to me that I was carrying anger in my mind. What could be the origin of this anger? Some years later, I talked to a counselor about my troubled mind. He helped me discover things I never suspected in my life. I have discovered that my actions were motivated by a sense of winning approvals, acceptance, and love. I was searching ways to affirm myself, to demonstrate that I was capable, that I was somebody. And to achieve my goal, I have developed an ability to 'sacrifice' my emotions and feelings, and anything that I loved. I ended up loosing my sense of self-appreciation. Unless someone else appreciated me or my actions, I was not able to be pleased. My counselling sessions helped me on one hand to understand that the root of this problem was to be found in my early age, through my family background and in the other hand I discovered that I do not have to live my present life with the motive to prove to others, especially some family members, or myself that I was somebody. I learned that I do not have to compete with other people, but that I could work hand in hand with them to have a better result. I have often come head-to-head with my own handicaps, limitations, and inner poverty. I did not always find it easy, especially when my failure was evident to others. But then I began to realize that in order to accept other people's disabilities and to help them to grow, it was fundamental for me to accept my own. I have, after all, learned something of my own character. I am gradually learning to accept my own shadow areas and to work with them in order to diminish their power over me. How many people, just like me, are more or less governed by instincts and drives that originate in the beautiful and painful experiences of childhood? How many people still believe that to be a success and to be admired, means that we be competent in what we do? But for most of us, it is not enough just to be good at something. True success, we feel, comes from the recognition of others. This desire for success and admiration can be a good thing, for it encourages us to work well and hard; however, such a desire for success can draw us away from acting justly and serving others. It is true that everyone needs approval and recognition, but if the lack of these causes intense anxiety and anguish with a feeling of being unworthy and unloved, then something is wrong with the person's self concept. I believe that the development of a healthy personality brings a person closer to God and others.